Newsroom

Jun 15, 2011

At the Region Forward Coalition kickoff event on June 10 Barbara McCann Executive Director of the National Complete Streets Coalition spoke about her experience leading the Coalition how its mission aligns with Region Forward and what Coalition members can do to make sure they are successful in making a more accessible sustainable prosperous and livable metropolitan Washington region.

Jun 14, 2011

Creating the Region Forward vision was hard work. Using Region Forward to measure progress prioritize needs and jumpstart projects will be an even more challenging endeavor. Fortunately the new group responsible for taking Region Forward to the next level is more than up to the task.

Jun 9, 2011

On June 8 two gatherings were held that reinforced why Region Forward holds great promise to be a catalyst for renewed regional focus and action.

Jun 8, 2011

A 15 percent increase in the participation rate for SNAP (formerly known as the Food Stamps program) could generate approximately $70 million in additional economic activity in the metropolitan Washington region.

Jun 8, 2011

We’ve written previously about the understandable dilemma environmentalists often face when confronted with the notion of putting a price on nature . How exactly do you put a dollar figure on the planet? It seems almost offensive to compare clean air and water to Dior bags and Blu-Ray players. However when rationality isn’t sufficient to promote environmental protection (we only have one planet after all) it may be necessary to look to the almighty dollar.

Jun 7, 2011

The iconic Metro map is being redesigned more than thirty years after it was first unveiled. The original designer Lance Wyman has been chosen to update his creation. There are a lot of issues to consider such as geographic accuracy vs. clarity what services to include (commuter rail connections the Purple Line streetcars etc.) the addition of new lines and upcoming changes to existing lines (Silver Line Blue Line changes) and how to manage long station names just to name a few.

Jun 6, 2011

Unless the world starts taking serious action on climate change very soon we may all be tuning into The Weather Channel rather than Cinemax for our horror fix. That’s the point of a recent piece in Newsweek in which Sharon Begley puts the future of the planet should we continue to dawdle on climate change into terrifying perspective .

Jun 2, 2011

Admittedly it doesn’t flow off the tongue quite like s mart growth but the Triple Bottom Line is a similarly comprehensive concept. The Triple Bottom Line (TBL/3BL) expands the traditional economic-centric “bottom line” to account for two other factors: social and environmental. And as it relates to planning that’s what Region Forward is all about: promoting growth while ensuring that it has not only a positive economic impact but positive social and environmental impacts as well.

Jun 1, 2011

The “new economy” is a term that’s been bandied around for awhile. In general it’s meant to reflect the transition from a manufacturing-driven economy to a largely service-based economy that has occurred in many Western nations since the late 20 th century. However in one major sense it’s a misnomer. The new economy is in fact still running largely on old power .

May 31, 2011

City rankings are wildly abundant and as we’ve written before many of them have questionable criteria at best. Although there’s no shortage of “most livable cities” indexes there is little variation among most of them (the top listings often going to mid-sized cities in Canada Australia and Scandinavia) the common element frequently missing is the megacity. Though they can be some of the most sustainable places to live (thanks to dense land use and high transit usage) megacities are hard to​